


Our Broken Edges Fit Together

by shadowolfhunter



Series: Fixing What's Broken [2]
Category: Grimm (TV)
Genre: Coping, Domestic Violence, Emotional Fallout, M/M, fixing it, injuries, the aftermath
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-04-23
Updated: 2015-04-26
Packaged: 2018-03-25 11:24:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,472
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3808552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadowolfhunter/pseuds/shadowolfhunter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sean Renard tried to fix Juliette Silverton for Nick Burkhardt, and got himself half-killed in the process. Three months on Sean's not coping, Nick is desperate to fix it for Sean, with whom he's fallen in love, and because Nick feels he owes Juliette.</p><p>Juliette feels the same way, and she plans to collect.</p><p>Just not quite the way Nick planned.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Breaking

Sean Renard eased his right arm back into the sling, and tried to keep a straight face. Two weeks of physio so far, and his shoulder felt no better. He knew it was going to be slow, and painful, but so far there seemed to be no improvement in anything, especially his fine motor skills. Picking up things with his right hand, holding a pen and writing, even a mug of coffee, painful and awkward. He dropped things all the time.

He had been recommended to attend the department shrink, which to a private contained man like Sean that was a nightmare.

He couldn’t even talk about it with his Grimm. He was not going to discuss his feelings with a stranger.

He sat in the chair, and stared moodily at the physio-therapist, who scribbled something on his pad, and since Sean had long since cultivated the ability to read upside down, he wasn’t pleased to discover that the man had his doubts about Sean’s ability to handle it. “Well, Captain, I have to say I had hoped that you would be further forward than this. Are you doing the exercises?”

“Yes.” Sean tried to keep his tone level, the exercises hurt and as far as he could see, so far, no pay off for all the pain.

He answered all the questions, took the new exercise schedule from the physio and left the clinic, hailing a cab he headed back to the house he was now sharing with Nick.

Since his abortive attempts to help Juliette, Sean had rarely been back to his own house, sleeping there was proving impossible. He’d tried, but closing his eyes brought back memories of the moment that Juliette looked him in the eye and shot him through his horribly torn, dislocated shoulder.

Renard felt his heart rate go up, his breathing became shallower, and he fought for control. Only three weeks since the second operation on his shoulder, he was bound to be finding it difficult… or so Nick said.

Nick’s house didn’t have the security that his new home did, but then it didn’t have the bad memories, even being shot on the doorstep was nothing to what he had willingly invited into his home.

He paid the taxi driver, slipped up the steps, and used his key. Pushing the door closed, he felt a strange feeling of peace settle over him.

Sean closed his eyes. This was crazy. He was the Prince of Portland for heaven’s sake, one little incident in his mixed up life and he was coming apart at the seams.

He eased his coat off, and hung it up. Getting dressed was an exercise in awkward, he had to have Nick help him into his polo shirt, since raising his right arm, in fact pretty much doing anything that involved the use of his shoulder was not going to happen.

He dug his cell phone out of his pocket, fumbled a little with the text, and told Nick he was home. Resisted the urge to add the word safe, not at all because he was starting to feel like the girl in this relationship.

Sean dropped his phone on the kitchen counter, and took a deep breath. Enough. He reached into the fridge for a beer, and headed for the couch to wait for Nick.

Then, when Nick was home, they were going to have a miserable, awkward and possibly even unpleasant conversation about this, and his Grimm was going to be his usual caring self, and just maybe Sean could get his head together, because right now he had the feeling his boyfriend was going to be the only one who would be able to help him.

[][][][][]

Nick felt the buzz of an incoming message and checked, Sean was home, Nick mentally added the word safe and smiled. A smile tinged with worry.

Sean was not himself.

His smooth, sophisticated Captain was handling his injuries and the aftermath of being so seriously injured very badly.

Nick admitted to being somewhat obtuse at times, it had taken Monroe to point out that Sean wasn’t coping with things, and now Nick had had those things pointed out to him, he could see that it wasn’t just the shoulder that his boyfriend was having trouble with.

Sean seemed reluctant to even try to use his hand, pick up a glass, hold a pen, any of it. Emotionally, it was as though the Captain was at war with his right arm. The sling had become the crutch he clung to, and Nick was scared what this might mean for Sean’s long-term recovery and his overall mental health.

Part of it, Nick was absolutely certain, was because Juliette was still out there. Sean could not feel safe or able to heal without knowing that she was going to pay for what she had done to him.

In public Sean Renard was the urbane police captain he had always seemed to Nick. In private, he was badly shaken, even a little clingy.

And that right there was wrong. Sean Renard was not clingy. The wary and cultured captain didn’t have a clingy bone in his body. But night after night, Sean slept cuddled up against his Grimm.

Pressed against Nick, burrowed in, and Nick would hold him. Last night they had lain together, Sean shivering and Nick had been at a loss to know how to help him.

So he had done what he could, stroked the Captain’s back gently up and down in a slow rhythm, waiting for that little hint that Sean was relaxed enough to fall asleep.

It took a long time.

Nick had snapped a couple of weeks back. He had to bring Juliette in, if not for her, then for the sanity of the man he now realized he truly loved. Nick actually owed this to both of them.

So when news came in of where Juliette might be, he grabbed his keys and just went. He could hear Hank behind him calling to him to hang on, but Nick couldn’t wait. The memory of Sean in his arms driving him on.

It was an old, run down, and isolated factory on the edge of town, and if he had stopped to think about it for two seconds, he would have recognized the set up and been wary.

Of course he wasn’t, the attack came from behind, a sudden excruciating pain in his right shoulder which made him stumble. He had a split second to glance at it, four knives, two of them at least buried to the hilt in his flesh, he couldn’t move his arm at all, then she was on him, and he barely parried her blow with his left arm as she danced out of reach, and he heard her laugh.

“And I thought you were the Grimm, Nick. Come on… lop my head off.” Something about her taunting laughter didn’t sound quite sane, and he knew then that he was in all sorts of trouble.

“Juliette. Please.” He held out his left hand, pleading. Her face was harder and her eyes colder than he had ever seen her. He felt sick then, both for what he had done, and the realization that this was what Sean must have seen as she shot him in both shoulders and left him to bleed out.

He sensed her next blow and managed to twist away, trying to keep her off him, praying that someone would come soon, because Nick was in a mess and Juliette had the upper hand.

Something sliced into his left leg, and he screamed as his leg buckled beneath him and he fell heavily on his right shoulder. The jolt whited out his vision, and he blacked out.


	2. Wounds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nick is badly injured by Juliette.

Monroe was worried. It was bad enough when they brought Nick in, but someone from dispatch had informed the Captain. Looking at the man, it didn’t take a genius to figure out that someone hadn’t exactly been subtle about it, because damn. Thankfully, Hank had called Monroe.

Sean Renard looked drained of colour, and Monroe could smell the distress coming off of him in waves. Outwardly, the Captain was the calm, urbane officer that Monroe had come to know, his shielding was more than a little off however, if you looked past the surface Renard looked a couple of steps from a complete breakdown.

Since Sean and Nick had gotten together, the Captain’s emotions were less of a mystery to the blutbad. Now they were torn wide open and laid bare, and what with everything that Monroe could see, and smell, they were not in a good happy place. Nick’s injuries were bad, and Sean wasn’t dealing any better with the knowledge that Nick had been injured in a fight with Juliette than he was handling the aftermath of his own injuries at her hands.

Something very protective coursed through Monroe, out of sight of the rest of the officers standing around, he gently put a hand on Renard’s back, guided him to a quiet part of the waiting area. Coaxed him to sit, and handed him a coffee.

Renard still looked lost, and terrified for Nick, but he also seemed to realize for the first time that Monroe was actually there.

Monroe was used to the superior, mildly amused royal; the shattered, frightened, almost pathetically grateful green eyes looking up at him was a shock. 

Monroe needed to hand him off to Rosalee.

[][][][][]

As they took Nick through the doors where Hank couldn’t follow, the big man took a moment or two to compose himself.

Finding Nick like that; for a few seconds, the only thought rushing through Hank’s head was that Juliette had killed his partner. Nick on the ground, so still, blood leaking from the multiple wounds in his shoulder, but it was Nick’s leg… a bloodstain that big, spreading that fast!

The perpetrator standing over the victim.

Hank’s brain was in denial, but instinct stepped in, as Juliette smiled at him, “Hello Hank… happy to see me?” Eyes registered the huge knife in her hand, the imminent threat to Nick’s unconscious person, Hank’s finger did something non-fatal, and fast. He fired.

Not actually caring about Juliette, his only thought to get to Nick and stop the bleeding.

Juliette shrieked, but she was already falling back away from Nick, clutching at her leg the knife dropping from her hand, and Hank retained sufficient sense to see Wu kick it away, Wu’s voice saying, “I’ve got this, you deal with Nick.” And then Hank’s hands were on Nick’s body, and he was reaching for his own knife.

He crouched down, slit up the leg of Nick’s jeans to expose the deep wound, and pulled the little first aid kit from his inside pocket. Hank’s career had begun in the military, and he never quite got out of the habit of carrying field dressings. Just two.

The wound was bad, Hank didn’t know how she had done it, but Juliette had slashed Nick’s calf and into the back of his knee, effectively hamstringing him, the slash so deep that Hank could see bone.

The shoulder was bleeding sluggishly, but the leg was absolutely gushing, so both dressings went on Nick’s leg and Hank’s grip was tight.

“I’ve called for a couple of buses. They’re five minutes out.” Wu said.

Hank nodded, not relaxing his grip. When his hands clamped down on the wound, Nick had groaned, and now that he had a grip on things, Hank wished that he could do something about Nick’s level of comfort.

The young Grimm was sprawled, half on his front, half on his side. He was moving very little, but he was moving, and Hank took some heart from that.

Then the EMTs were there, and taking over, and Hank had time to take stock of the situation. Sean Renard was Nick’s emergency contact, and Hank knew Wu would have told dispatch. He fervently hoped that whoever informed Renard took into account the Captain’s somewhat weakened condition and broke it to him gently.

Hank went with Nick in the ambulance, he had tried to take over with Juliette, but Wu had waved him off, “I got this, you go with Nick.” He could hear the understanding in Wu’s tone, and frowned at that, he wasn’t the one injured and traumatized here.

It didn’t take Hank long to realize that whoever informed Renard had done a really bad job. Renard looked grey around the edges and was clearly struggling. Monroe had moved the Captain to a quiet corner, and was shielding him, but took long enough from the shielding and care-giving to throw a slightly reproachful glare in Hank’s direction.

Hank sighed. Though technically it was nothing to do with him or Wu or anybody, Renard was a grown man, their Captain, and just because he was Nick’s boyfriend it didn’t make either of them the girl. But perhaps he should have handled it, because they all knew that the Captain’s injuries had taken a serious toll on him, and now Nick being injured by the same person who had harmed Sean, that was bound to mess with his head.

Since it was Juliette, frankly it was messing with everybody.

The coffee slopped onto the back of Hank’s hand, and he realized with a shock that his hands were trembling.

He put the coffee aside and squeezed them together tightly. Now, when his partner, and his partner’s partner needed support so badly, was not the time for Hank Griffin to crack up.

[][][][][]

Sean sat down by his love’s side and reached out to take Nick’s hand in his.

They were in a mess and no mistake.

Sean’s right arm was still useless, now Juliette had crippled Nick in almost the same way. Going for his right arm because Nick was right-handed as was Sean.

His own injury, Sean knew was more chance than anything else, but Nick, Juliette had failed to kill Sean and put the blame on Nick, so she had gone for injuries that were both potentially life threatening, and could finish Nick’s career if he survived.

A cunning and cruel plan.

And she might just succeed.

Sean squeezed Nick’s hand, tried not to look at Nick’s left leg, knee heavily bandaged, resting on a small mound of pillows. Surgery had taken hours, and according to the surgeon, Nick was young, strong with good levels of fitness, as long as the sliced tendons took again, there was no reason he wouldn’t make a full recovery. But Sean had not made Captain by taking everything at face value. He knew the man was holding things back.

They would cross that bridge when they came to it. Sean had enough money to get Nick the best surgeon, whatever it took.


End file.
